Try Corleone's. I prefer their Tomato Pie over DeLorenzo's (Rt#33). It's mostly a take out & delivery place with just a few very small tables.Not the best dining atmosphere, but parking is convenient and safe.

Chaz, I am away grima home base and can not post a lot, but the pizza was at Joeys in Hamilton, home of Marcucas. I think I found a dough to try. Norma

Norma, please tell me what you liked about Joey's pizza. I went there only one time (Jun 2011) and ordered an old fashoined Pie and an italian hoagie. Both were terrible. I hated the pizza sauce. Hoagie had a light soggy bun, not enough meat and big chunky toppings. I had to dissassemble it, cut up the topping and reassemble. I had it down as one of the worse pizza shops ever.

Norma, please tell me what you liked about Joey's pizza. I went there only one time (Jun 2011) and ordered an old fashoined Pie and an italian hoagie. Both were terrible. I hated the pizza sauce. Hoagie had a light soggy bun, not enough meat and big chunky toppings. I had to dissassemble it, cut up the topping and reassemble. I had it down as one of the worse pizza shops ever.

---pete---

pete,

I liked everything about Joey's pizza. The whole pizza was very balanced in Bill's and my opinions. The crust was great, the sauce was also great and the cheese (was all cheddar) was also very good. I will post photos sometime soon. We tried Papa's pizza too. I will post more when I get home.

Norma, the tomato pie I speak of from Utica is a rectangular pie, thick, soft, bready crust, covered in a thick layer of rich, slightly sweet tomato sauce with just a dusting of i believe romano cheese. The deli bakes them up early in the morning and they are boxed and stacked behind the counter for sale that day. Always are served at room temp, never hot. I'm not sure of their exact cooking procedure, but they somehow manage to get the pies throughly cooked without any crispness to the crust, the crust remains soft. Not sure if that is the Trenton style, but both are called "tomato pies". I have a relative from the Montreal area who says they have very similar pies there.

Norma, please tell me what you liked about Joey's pizza. I went there only one time (Jun 2011) and ordered an old fashoined Pie and an italian hoagie. Both were terrible. I hated the pizza sauce. Hoagie had a light soggy bun, not enough meat and big chunky toppings. I had to dissassemble it, cut up the topping and reassemble. I had it down as one of the worse pizza shops ever.

---pete---

Pete,

In the post I am soon going to make I will show pictures and tell why Bill and I really liked Joey's Pizza. I am sorry to hear you had such a bad experience at Joey's Pizza. The one man at Joey's told us that Joey's really wasn't open a lot of hours before, but now that has changed. I really don't know when that changed, but Joey's Pizza looked very clean to us.

Norma, the tomato pie I speak of from Utica is a rectangular pie, thick, soft, bready crust, covered in a thick layer of rich, slightly sweet tomato sauce with just a dusting of i believe romano cheese. The deli bakes them up early in the morning and they are boxed and stacked behind the counter for sale that day. Always are served at room temp, never hot. I'm not sure of their exact cooking procedure, but they somehow manage to get the pies throughly cooked without any crispness to the crust, the crust remains soft. Not sure if that is the Trenton style, but both are called "tomato pies". I have a relative from the Montreal area who says they have very similar pies there.

Dave,

I think I am familiar with the kind of tomato pies you are talking about. I haven't been to Utica and tried their tomato pies, but the tomato pies Steve and I had near Philly sound just about like the tomato pies you are talking about. The one Steve and I had was also cold and it did remain just about soft when eaten.

This is the first part of Bill's and my journey to try a Trenton “tomato pie”. Bill has tried many tomato pies in Trenton, but not lately. We first stopped at a location where De Lorenzo's was opened just last year Bill said, but not the original location. They were closed up and there were no signs of them ever opening again. I think Bill said he just ate there last year. That De Lorenzo's wasn't far from Bill's home. Bill said there was a De Lorenzo's at a supermarket, but we decided to go to the new De Lorenzo's. Much to our disappointment De Lorenzo's wasn't open until 4 PM on Saturday. Bill then decided to take me to Joey's Pizza, which was at one time the home of the original Maruca's. Bill told me it was still owned by Maruca's relatives, but the owner wasn't there when we arrived. I talked to the one man and also the pieman. Joey's Pizza was very clean in appearance to me and Bill. In a few of the photos it can be seen there is an All Trump bag of flour in the background in a crate on the flour and the bag appeared to be opened.

I asked the pieman what temperature the Roto Flex oven was kept at and he told me 511 degrees F. I also asked how long the neat oven took to bake a pizza. The pieman told me about 6 minutes. The tomato pie at Joey's was Bill's and my favorite pie that we tried. I loved the crust, fresh flavor of the tomato sauce and the cheese on Joey's tomato pie. If I could only make a crust that good, I sure would be happy. The crust was very easy to bite, but it had a crispness that I never tasted before and the crust also had a very good flavor. The pieman told me that they use mozzarella cheese and also Joey's Pizza website says the same thing, but when Bill and I tasted the pizza and the cheese we both thought it was cheddar only that was on the tomato pie. I then talked to the other man that was there at that time and finally found out they do really use only cheddar on their pizzas. I can be seen on the last photo if it is looked at closely that the digital oven temperature was 508 degrees F. The other man told me if the owner would have been there is could tell me the whole story about Joey's and also Maruca's.

When we left Joey's I went to the end of that little strip mall and looked for dumpster cans. There were three in a row. I went there and talked to a man that was chopping parts of a tree down. Bill went to the car, I guess because he knew I would be asking questions. The man that was chopping the tree some was a maintenance man for the mall and said he was chopping parts of that big tree down since hurricane Sandy and really had a lot more to chop when he found time. I looked into the 3 dumpsters (because they were opened and the man was throwing some big pieces of wood in the dumpsters). I sure don't know if any of the dumpsters were Joey's or if everyone uses the same dumpsters, but there were no dumpsters behind any of the stores in that little strip mall. I saw some empty boxes of Full Red Sauce, but don't know if they were Joey's or might have been from a Subway across a little street. Bill told me most tomato pies in Trenton don't have much of any seasonings added to the sauce. The sauce tasted sweet to me and we thought it went well with the pizza. The pizza we ate did have little pieces of tomatoes in the sauce and not any other seasonings I could detect.

When I find time to resize the next batch of photos of when we tried to go to the supermarket were the other De Lorenzo's was supposed to be, I also will post a recipe the man gave me there for 50 lbs. of flour. I wonder if someone would help me convert that recipe to a formulation if it is possible? The De Lorenzo's that was supposed to be at the next stop had then changed hands to another pizza place recently, but the crust was very similar to Joey's in the crust. I know the bake temperature of the next tomato pie and also know they used a flour that is like bread flour.

Try Corleone's. I prefer their Tomato Pie over DeLorenzo's (Rt#33). It's mostly a take out & delivery place with just a few very small tables.Not the best dining atmosphere, but parking is convenient and safe.

Thanks for the tip to try Corleone's! We didn't get there today to try their pizza because Bill made me a pizza and I was busy learning to make coffee and tea that tastes like Snapple. Bill said we will go to Corlenone's the next time I visit Trenton. Bill said Colrenone's isn't too far from his home and he might go there by himself to try their pizzas.

Bill took me to what was supposed to be De Lorenzo's at Risoldi's Market, but they are also closed now. http://www.delospizza.com/locations.htm Bill and I don't know when the De Lorenzo's at Risoldi's Market closed. I talked to the man that runs the pizzeria at Risoldi's Market now and he said De Lornezo's did run that pizzeria, but doesn't anymore. I ordered one slice of the tomato pie at Risoldi's market even though it wasn't De Lorenzo's pizza. The tomato pie at Risoldi's was very good, but the sweetness of the sauce and the cheese wasn't like Joey's, but the crust was very similar and was very good. I got to talking to the man that runs the pizzeria now and he has been making pizzas for 40 years and did formerly own two pizzerias. He got to run the pizzeria at Risoldi's now by knowing the owner of that supermarket. I started out by asking how I could make a pizza at home like he does. I asked lots of questions and the man was very friendly and answered them all. These are the tomato pies at Risoldi's now. I am kinda confused at the sign outside Risoldi's and the menu inside.

Bill left me again when I was doing the questioning and went to his car to wait for me. I found it quite amusing in all the driving we did around Trenton that there are so many pizzerias that say they offer tomato pies.

After talking to the man that runs the pizzeria at Risoldi's Market & Cafe http://www.risoldimarket.com/ he gave me the recipe he uses for his tomato pie pizza crust. If anyone is interested the slide photo show at the top of the Risoldi's website page, it can be seen the tomato pies that are made at Risoldi's are baked in a Baker's Pride oven. The man that now runs the pizzeria inside Risoldi's and I talked about the tomato pies at Risoldi's and I had asked why De Lorenzo's had left Risoldi's. The man told me that there are two sets of families that have run the De Lorenzo's pizzerias. I don't really understand what that is all about and then why they left Risoldi's, but talking to the man that now runs the pizzeria at Risoldi's was interesting.

I did tell the man that I do try to make pizzas at home and asked for his advice in how I could try to make a tomato pie at home like the tomato pie at Risoldi's. I did tell the man I live in Lancaster county Pa. and came to Trenton to see what a tomato pie was like and why they are so different. The man told me he did have a pizzeria in Bucks county Pa., but doesn't have it anymore. He also owned a pizzeria near Seaside Heights at one point in his life.

Bill and I liked the crust at Risoldi's almost as good as the crust we had at Joey's. I can't really explain right how both of those crusts were, but for some reason they are the best crusts I have eaten to this date. I really don't know what makes those crusts that good, but maybe I found a clue between Joey's Pizza http://www.joeyspizzaofhamilton.com/ and Rosoldi's but both tomato pies are baked at lower temperatures than most of us here on the forum bake our pizzas and also at what temperature I bake my pizzas at market. At least for me, these crusts were better than any crusts I have had in NY or anywhere for this type of pizza. If I can explain the best I can the crusts do eat very easily and are crispy on the bottom crust and also on the rim crust. The crunch I think makes the bottom crust and rim crust good, but there isn't any way that they is much of any chewiness to them if that makes any sense. There both weren't tough in any way either.

The man first gave me advice as what flour to try in that he said high gluten flour. I asked what he meant by high gluten flour. I asked if it was high gluten flour that I couldn't purchase. He said bread flour would work well and that was what he uses. I did explain that I did have a pizza stone, but said I only heat the oven for about 15 minutes before I do try to make my pizzas. He told me about how thick the stones are in the Baker's Pride ovens he uses at Risoldi's. He also told me it takes two hours for the stones to get up to the temperature of 475 degrees F. He first told me what to try with 1 lb. of flour, but then I asked him if he could tell me what weighs he uses to make his pizzas. This is what he told me he uses for 50 lbs. of flour that makes about 80 lbs. of dough. He said he uses 15 quarts of water. I then asked if he uses regular salt and he said no he uses Kosher salt. I didn't ask how much salt he uses, but the crust in the salt amount tasted like it was between 1.75-2.00% in Kosher salt. I then asked if he uses any oil in his dough. He picked up a quart container and said that is how much oil he uses for 50 lbs. of flour. I would have liked to ask the man if he uses bakers percentages, but I didn't want to let on that I knew about bakers percentages and from what I have gathered from pizzerias so far is a lot of them don't used bakers percentages. I then asked what kind of oil he uses in the dough and he said it was olive oil. I asked if the olive oil I have at home for sauteing and grilling would work okay and he said yes it would. I would have liked to ask about his mix time and how he does that, but didn't want to let on I knew that much about pizza dough. I did ask if he uses a same day dough and he said no, the dough is cold fermented for one day. I sure don't know how much hydration the dough would have with the amounts of ingredients he gave me. Bill told me after I told him about what the pizza man told me that most places in Trenton do use Pillsbury flour and said he knows the distributor that delivers to Joey's. He is going to call the distributor and talk to him. Bill can purchase products from the distributor and we went by where the distributor is located, but they were closed on a Saturday. I don't know what kind of Pillsbury flour under the commercial umbrella of flours would be considered a bread flour in the commercial flour realm. I know I did try Pillsbury Balancer at one time in my pizza learning experiences, but that is a really high gluten flour in my opinion.

I am also going to try to call Joey's pizza this week and see if I can find out more about Marcuas. Marcuas, Joey's and my beloved (or at once beloved ) Mack's pizzas are all related in some way and I intend to find out more about that if I can. Trenton is a city of different pizzerias that have been around for a long time.

This post is about Bill's and my visit to Papa's Pizza in Trenton. We visited Papa's around dinner time. I would have liked to try the mustard pizza, but Bill didn't go for the idea of a mustard pizza and we couldn't try two pizzas, because we already had other Trenton tomato pies earlier in the day. We settled for a sausage pizza.

To be honest the pizza was over-baked and the bottom crust and rim crust were tough. We both left the bones, which I usually never do and Bill doesn't either. I really don't think the photos show how dark the bottom crust was. The crust seemed to make the whole pizza not as good as it might have been. Bill has lived in Hamilton, NJ since he was 8 years old and said when he worked for the newspaper for 20 years that they purchased Papa's pizza for their employees different times and Bill said he recalls that Papa's pizza wasn't as good as other Trenton pizzerias, but was decent. I know everyone has their own tastes when eating pizzas though. The cheese definitely tasted like mozzarella, but the sauce tasted kinda bland and a little bit sour. I really don't understand why the sauce tasted like that, because 7/11's are a good sauce in my opinion.

Nick couldn't have been any nicer and so was our waitress. They both made our time at Papa's really nice. I positioned myself so I could watch what was going on in the kitchen. I did get to go into the kitchen and watch what went on after we ate our pizza.

The third photo of the history of Papa's and what it reads about what a “proper” tomato pie is was interesting to me. I felt like we ate in a real old pizzeria which was nice in itself. 100 years old is a lot of years to be open in the pizzeria world.

The only think I noticed that they added to the 7/11 sauce was pepper and it looked like a fair amount of pepper. I enjoyed reading what I could about Papa's history in the booklet that was at each table.

Your pics tell the story. The pies you show from Joey's don't look like the one I had there in June 2011. In fact, they look great. I may have to try Joey's again. I must have hit them on a bad day.

The other Joey's issue about cleanliness, I agree with you the place is very clean and I loved the atmosphere. My complaint was that he was folding pizza boxes and the bottom box was sitting on the floor. Even with a clean place, I never want to see a pizza box sitting on the floor.

Papas...

I ate at Papa's just one time about 1 year ago. I thought the pie was exceptionally good and it was not burnt on the bottom as your pics show. My only complaints about Papa's was the lack of secure parking and the drinks were too small. Two drinks would have been too much and one drink was not quite enough.

So I think the lesson learned is that we can't totally base our opinions on just one visit to any pizza shop because it seems none of them are consistent in their quality controls. It might even be helpful to mention the day and time of our visit because quality might depend upon who's baking the pie. In other words, a day shift might yield different pizza than an evening shift.

Anyway, next time in the Trenton Area, I hope you get to try Delorenzos', and Corleones. Corleone's has one unique feature... a free bag of Zeppoles with each order!

Your pics tell the story. The pies you show from Joey's don't look like the one I had there in June 2011. In fact, they look great. I may have to try Joey's again. I must have hit them on a bad day.

The other Joey's issue about cleanliness, I agree with you the place is very clean and I loved the atmosphere. My complaint was that he was folding pizza boxes and the bottom box was sitting on the floor. Even with a clean place, I never want to see a pizza box sitting on the floor.

Papas...

I ate at Papa's just one time about 1 year ago. I thought the pie was exceptionally good and it was not burnt on the bottom as your pics show. My only complaints about Papa's was the lack of secure parking and the drinks were too small. Two drinks would have been too much and one drink was not quite enough.

So I think the lesson learned is that we can't totally base our opinions on just one visit to any pizza shop because it seems none of them are consistent in their quality controls. It might even be helpful to mention the day and time of our visit because quality might depend upon who's baking the pie. In other words, a day shift might yield different pizza than an evening shift.

Anyway, next time in the Trenton Area, I hope you get to try Delorenzos', and Corleones. Corleone's has one unique feature... a free bag of Zeppoles with each order!

---pete---

Pete,

Maybe you did hit Joey's on a bad day and I might have also just had the only pizza at Papa's that was burnt on the day I was there. Papa's was fairly busy when we were there and no one elses pizzas looked burnt on the bottom crust.

I can understand your concern about a pizza box sitting on the floor, even if the pizzeria is clean.

I only had water at Papa's so I really don't know how big their regular drinks are.

I also agree that the lesson that is learned is we can't totally base our opinions on just one visit to any pizza shop. When a group of us went to NY there was one place that we visited that was supposed to have really good pizzas, but most of us didn't think that pizza was really good. We also could have visited too early, or just had bad pies on that day.

If you are interested, look what BOARDWALKER posted after my Reply at 1711 http://www.pizzamaking.com/forum/index.php/topic,9068.msg254567.html#msg254567 Those pizzas at Mack's are considered “tomato pies” too. I don't know how Mack's manages to be so inconsistent either. I think Joey's is related to Mack's and Manco & Manco, but I sure don't know how all that happened, but it was supposed to have happened in Trenton, NJ. I have to see if I can find more information about that. I do know though even though I watch each of my pizzas when I made them and bake them, none of them are exactly the same. Maybe in the future I will be calling my pizzas at market Trenton “tomato pies” instead of “boardwalk pizzas”.

Bill is supposed to call Forconi Foods in Hamilton this week. He knows the owner and says that they are the distributor for Joey's. Hopefully, Bill can find some things about Joey's pizza.

I also hope I get to try De Lorenzos and Corleones tomato pies in the future. I would also love a free bag of Zeppoles. I would have gone to those two pizzerias on Sunday, but Bill was showing me other things and really didn't want to drive all around the next day.